Interview with Sergali Adilbekov, founder of Swiss Social

Please introduce yourself to the readers of this blog and update us on your latest ventures.

My name is Sergali, I am originally from Kazakhstan, educated in the USA, and now living in Switzerland. My career brought to many different industries such as private equity, agricultural and construction equipment, all vertical chain of oil & gas businesses, and accumulating many social contacts through work and travel I decided to start a few social initiatives that would let me share interesting things among the people that I know and offer them a platform to network with each other at a cardinally new high-quality level. That's when I started my two latest ventures - I'm the Founder & Curator of TEDxLugano conference and the Founder & Owner of Swiss Social networking club.

The goal and purpose of Greek Social Network Club and introduction to the wider global organization?

Greek Social is one of the daughter projects of Swiss Social (that became quite viral and successful in Switzerland). Our vision is to create local networking clubs that would allow all-inclusive membership, which means - people are not discriminated towards like it's done currently in all other networking societies - we do not exclude anyone due to their specialized interests (expats, professionals, students, women-only societies, etc.) and instead offer everyone a chance to come and build their own personal networks through our resources. One of the biggest breakthroughs that we have introduced is we require our event organizational team to study the profiles of the people coming and connect them by making the first introductions, that way people avoid feeling the discomfort of having to that themselves. The organizers prepare and know who to introduce to who, raising infinitely the probability of a good friendly/professional relationship match.

Do you see opportunities nowadays in the Greek economy? Your opinion on the Greek startup ecosystem? The Greek economy is objectively in a dire state at the moment, therefore people need to reorganize in order to find a way to make it work again. If someone wants to have new results, he/she has to think in new ways. Greek Social offers a completely new plane of interactions, free of politics or economics, which would enable the new cohesion within the society. Imagine the "active networking" as a potential instrument to re-stitch the society from within into a better organized circles of connections which will function much better than before, when people grew their personal networks through sporadic family or professional contacts.

The startup eco system in Greece plays a very important role here - these are the advanced guys with a vision into the future, only they can change the country's situation, only they can offer to be the best examples of structured builders of their own social circles. I believe Greek Social's main target is of course the entrepreneurs who have a love for all new ventures and would probably find it very interesting to participate in our social project.

Please close this interview the way you see fit.

At the moment, the Swiss Social team has done an experimental first networking event in Athens and has seen the huge potential in it as the people who came, expressed their desire to know more and to come to the upcoming events. We are looking for dedicated people locally who could be interested to enter our team of organizers in Athens to continue our networking events. The positions are all volunteer in our organization, but at the same time very rewarding as it gives the organizers an amazing visibility over the social scene locally.

We will be happy to receive the CVs of people interested to apply for these positions to info@swiss-social.com.

Bachelor degree in History and Philosophy of Science at the University
of Athens. Master of Science with a major in Economics at Jonkoping's
International Business School in Sweden. Interned for the Swedish
educational organization Bilda and consulted for their music sector. Founder of three technology startups. Marketing, Management & Business Development experience in Greek, Swedish and other international companies (USA, Germany, Israel, Cyprus, Bulgaria, etc.)

Music CV: Professional touring & recording musician since 2001.
Cooperated with various artists. I have been negotiating contracts with labels, booking events, marketing music effectively as a media product, online/offline in various countries/regions.